“Here, hi! Hullo! Here, what in the name o’ thunder! Ahoy! Help!”
Tom Bodger was standing bolt upright as he uttered these last words, fully realising what had happened as he stared down at a rugged hole in the frail planking of the bottom of the boat, up through which the water was rising like a thick, squat, dumpy fountain.
“What game d’yer call this, Master Aleck? Eh, not there? I seed his shadder. He must ha’ let it fall. Went through like a sixty-four-pound shot. Master Aleck! Ahoy! Frightened yerself away, my lad? Here, quick; come and lend a hand—the boat’s going down!”
Tom Bodger talked and shouted, but he did not confine himself to words, for he saw the extent of the emergency. The boat seemed to be filling rapidly from the salt fount in the middle prior to going down. So, acting promptly, he hopped on to the next thwart, down into the water in the bottom, which came above his stumps, and then on to the next thwart forward and the locker. From here he put one peg on to the bows and swung himself on to the lowest step, where he could seize the boat’s painter, fastened to a huge rusty ring in the harbour wall.
It was not many moments’ work to cast the rope loose, and then he began to haul the rope rapidly through the ring, just having time to send the boat’s head on to one of the steps under water, and hanging on with all his might, while the water rose and rose aft, till, with the bows still resting on the stone step, the after part of the boat was quite submerged.
As a rule there were fishermen hanging over the rail on the top of the cliff a couple of hundred yards or so away, men busy with trawl or seine net on the smacks and luggers, and a score or two of boys playing about somewhere on the pier; but there was, as Tom Bodger had said, something going on in the town, and as soon as those ashore had done watching the man-o’-war’s men and seen them row off, there was a steady human current setting away from the harbour, and not a listening ear to catch the sailor’s hails and pass the word on for help, as he hung on to the boat’s rope with all his might, feeling assured that if he slacked his efforts she would glide off the slimy stone and go to the bottom.
“I arn’t got no breath to waste in hollering,” he panted. “Why, there’s a good fathom and a half or two fathom o’ water under her keel, and if I slack out down she’ll go. Wants a couple o’ boats to back in, one on each side, and get a rope under her thwarts. They could get her ashore then. Oh, dear! oh, dear! oh, dear! For him to leave me in charge, and then come back and find I’ve sunk her! I warn’t asleep, for I was standin’ up at work, so I couldn’t ha’ dreamed I heard him come, and see his shadder cast down. No; it’s all true enough. But what could he have had in his hands? I see his shadder plain, with a something held up in his hands. Paper, didn’t he say, he’d come to fetch? Well, paper’s heavy when it’s all tight up in a lump, and he must ha’ pitched it down off the pier to save carrying it and to let it come plop, so as to frighten me, not thinking how heavy it was, and then as soon as he see the mischief he’d done he squirms and runs away like a bad dog with his tail between his legs. Why, I wouldn’t ha’ thought it on him.
“Oh, dear! what a weight she is! If I could only get a turn o’ the rope round anywhere I could hold on easy, but if I move an inch down she’ll go.
“Can’t do it!” he groaned; “it’s quite impossible. One hitch round the ring or a catch anywhere else’d do it, but I’ve got enough to do to hold on, and if I try any other manoover I shall make worse on it. It’s no good, Tommy, my lad, that there’s your job; bite yer teeth hard and hold on. Bime by it’ll be too much for yer, and she’ll begin to slide and slither; but don’t you mind, it’ll be all right—up’ll go your hands with the rope, and then in they’ll go, fingers first, into the ring. It’s big enough to take your pretty little fists as far as yer knuckleses, and then they’ll jam and jam more, and the more they jams the tighter they’ll hold the rope till some ’un comes. Take the skin off? Well, let it. Sarve it right for not being stuck tighter on to the hones. Have to grow again, that’s all. I arn’t going to let Master Aleck’s boat sink to the bottom if I die for it. But, hub, there! Ahoy! Is everybody dead yonder up town? Why, I’d say bless him now if I could on’y set a hye on the wery wust o’ them boys.”
The poor fellow hung on desperately, but he knew from his symptoms that he could not hold on much longer. The perspiration stood in huge drops all over his face, and they began to run together and trickle down, while now a queer thought flashed across his brain, bringing hope for the moment, but only for his heart to sink lower directly after.